JAIPUR, October 26: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday reiterated the charge that the ruling Congress was misusing the CBI for targeting its political adversaries, but did not have the courage to put the Prime Minister’s role under scanner in the coal block allocation case.
Addressing a public rally in Udaipur, he accused the CBI of showing double standards when it comes to political leaders of different shades.
The CBI had frozen into silence ever since the role of the Prime Minister’s Office came into question after the former Coal Secretary made direct allegations. “Just imagine. Had such allegations been levelled against Vasundhara Raje, Narendra Modi, Shivraj Singh or Raman Singh, the CBI would have thrown us behind bars within minutes.”
Mr. Modi said the CBI was targeting senior BJP leader in Rajasthan, Gulab Chand Kataria, in a fake encounter case because it was after Ms. Vasundhara Raje as the polls were approaching. “But when it comes to the Prime Minister, it is stunned into silence as if it has seen a snake.”
The BJP’s prime ministerial candidate lashed out at the Congress leaders and blamed the ruling party for rising inflation, spiralling onion prices, corruption and communal violence in different parts of the country. He said he would expose all “wrongdoings” of the UPA regime in the run-up to the Lok Sabha elections.
Calling upon the people in the tribal-dominated belt in southern Rajasthan to “let the lotus bloom” in the desert State, Mr. Modi said even the Centre did not have faith in the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government. The State government had failed to control communal incidents, for which the Minorities Commission and even the Supreme Court had snubbed it, he said.
Mr. Modi said Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi visited Gopalgarh after the communal violence in 2011 without informing the State’s Congress leadership. “Can you vote for the government on which even the ‘Shahzada’ [prince] has no trust?” he asked and pointed out that even the Governor, who was from the Congress, had scolded the State government for not implementing the tribal welfare schemes.
Mr. Rahul Gandhi’s information on Pakistan’s ISI contacting Muslim youths in the aftermath of Muzaffanagar riots was based on the feedback of a Rajasthan police officer, he said.
“I have come to know that a police officer of Rajasthan, who wants to contest [Assembly] elections on a Congress ticket, gave this information to him and he in turn used it in his address,” said Mr. Modi. Moreover, the “prince feels good in talking about family serials in his speeches and thinks it would help his party.”
